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Nikodemos Anasikeme
Nikodemos Anasikeme was the Prime Minister of Bicana from 470 until 483. He was known for his role in the beginning and escalation of his family's feud with the Porpatros family. Early life The Anasikeme family was a wealthy family during Dorio's governance of Bicana, and so Nikodemos was born into a luxurious household. Thus, he had little knowledge of or connection to the rebellion that grew during Bicana, and in fact the Anasikemes did not even announce their allegiance to Laurentios Merricon and the Bicanal state until 432. This declaration, belated though it was, helped the Anasikemes remain powerful under the Bicanal republic, and so Nikodemos was urged by his family to enter politics. Nikodemos first ran for parliament in 443, when he was nineteen, and was elected to represent the state of Arphis. Parliamentary career Nikodemos did not make extensive use of his parliamentary power during his first term, preferring instead to live lavishly and socialize with his aristocratic peers. He consequently received a fair amount of criticism from parliamentarians and laymen alike, but he made little effort to change his ways. Only in 451, when he began to consider reelection, did Nikodemos become a fully active member of the parliament. Nikodemos was among the more conservative members of the parliament, having hailed from the nobility, and so his most notable legislation from his first term was a bill proposing to tax votes. (Much of the Dorian-era feudal landholding had been excised, leaving Nikodemos little other recourse to limit the voting pool.) However, this bill failed, leaving Nikodemos an unimpressive legacy from his first term. Despite these setbacks, Nikodemos nevertheless used his family's wealth to run an effective campaign; this allowed him to narrowly win the 453 election. Conscious of his close call with irrelevance, Nikodemos ramped up his focus in his second term, and he introduced a wider slate of legislation intended to protect the wealth of the Bicanal upper class. His most successful bill from this term granted higher wages to landholders, using the assertion that taxation on land would otherwise be too burdensome. However, Nikodemos did have a rich career in his second term, and so when Angelos Bartos announced his upcoming retirement, Nikodemos made a bid for the office Prime Minister. During the Porpatros years Nikodemos ran another richly funded campaign, but newcomer Stamatis Porpatros had a wider appeal and consequently won the election in 463. Outraged, Nikodemos amassed support among the delegates from Arphis and formed a voting bloc designed to cripple Porpatros' power. During the 464–466 period, Porpatros proposed a number of bills designed to support the poor and disenfranchesed of Bicana; however, the largely conservative Anasikeme bloc prevented these bills from achieving any widespread success. This led to an eventual division in the parliament between the Porpatros and Anasikeme factions, and during the later years of Porpatros' term, debate became increasingly smothered by snide nitpicking, excessive vetoes, and outright insults. Porpatros eventually grew tired of the feud, and began to make friendly overtures toward Nikodemos; however, he died suddenly in 470, throwing the parliament into chaos. Prime ministry An emergency election was held in 470 in order to determine Porpatros' successor; Nikodemos was an early favorite, although he faced a degree of opposition from Stamatis' son Damasus Porpatros. However, Damasus was not viewed as having his father's political competence, and so Nikodemos won handily. Cognizant of the fact that he had an abbreviated term until the next election year, Nikodemos was quick to pass legislation that would help his allies stay in power; this included a second, and successful, attempt to pass his voting-tax bill. However, Damasus won his father's parliamentary seat, and so the Porpatros faction in the parliament became a strident— if ineffective— opposing block to the Anasikeme-dominated parliament. Having implemented a series of successful bills, Nikodemos again defeated Damasus in 473, and was reelected as Prime Minister. However, many of his cronies were ousted in that election, and so Damasus began gathering support of his own. During Nikodemos' full term, one of his most notable bills was the 477 Recommendation Act, which allowed parliamentary officials to "recommend" successors. A recommended successor would be elected by default, unless a civilian vote overrode the choice. This bill was enthusiastically supported by both sides, despite civilian displeasure, and it would go on to be a pivotal facet of the feud. The Recommendation Act allowed Nikodemos to groom his son Cyros for the post, since Nikodemos himself was advancing in age, and so even before 483 Nikodemos began handing more and more power over to Cyros. Ultimately, the vote to override Cyros failed, and so the prime ministry smoothly transitioned from one Anasikeme to the next. Nikodemos himself retired to a villa outside Arphisport, where he died peacefully in 486. Personal life Nikodemos had hoped to be a playboy, but was arranged into a marriage with Aglaia Serission in 444. Thus, during his hedonistic years he could not indulge in any visible affairs. Despite this, Nikodemos is known to have been adulterous during this time period, and he had several bastards, none of whom rose to any real prominence. However, after 450, Nikodemos began seeking to repair his tattered marriage with Aglaia. She was slow to warm up to him again, but eventually they were on at least friendly terms, and they ardently defended each other during the birth and heightening of the parliamentary division. Nikodemos viewed his children almost as tools, means to his end of political power; they had varied reactions to this, with Cyros taking wholeheartedly to this path and Akakios going as far as to leave Bicana entirely in the year 478. Category:Bicanals Category:Elected Officials Category:Government Heads Category:Anasikeme Family